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| China-Japan-Koreas | ||
| A rare look inside the Hanawon center for Nork defectors | ||
| 2009-07-22 | ||
Several express disappointment that South Korea is not the nirvana they had anticipated. They enjoy freedom and creature comforts, but feel like second-class citizens.
For the first time, officials on Wednesday allowed outsiders into the Hanawon resettlement center where North Korean defectors are debriefed. The open-house came at a time of increased tensions with North Korea, which in recent months has detonated a nuclear device, launched numerous missiles and amplified the rhetoric directed toward Seoul. Any event having to do with the North becomes an instant news media free-for-all. The celebration of the center's 10th anniversary was equal parts propaganda ploy, talent show and sob fest. Proud of their efforts to repatriate these lost cousins, South Korea officials produced several North Koreans to show just how fulfilled they were once free of the clutches of leader Kim Jong Il. These defectors sang! They played piano! They showed off paintings and poetry! But several later expressed disappointment that South Korea was not the nirvana they had thought. The life they have carved out here is at best bittersweet. While enjoying freedom and creature comforts, many find themselves second-class citizens. They pine for their families and simpler pleasures of home. "I have memories of the mountains and the rivers of North Korea," said Kim Chu-woong, a 35-year-old concert pianist. "The cigarettes and the alcohol taste different here. Often I get together with friends and we sing the old songs and our eyes get teary." The wake-up call for this new reality often comes at Hanawon. About 60% of the defectors are women. Each year, hundreds of refugees spend several months at this leafy center 30 miles south of Seoul. Nearly 90% of the 16,000 defectors in South Korea are Hanawon graduates -- most of whom made their way to South Korea after slipping across the border into China. They get a crash course in modernity and capitalism, learning how to use a computer and an ATM. But they're also being grilled by intelligence agents trying to weed out spies. Another center prepares defector children for enrollment in South Korean schools. A 2008 report by a South Korean lawmaker showed that 75% of nearly 600 residents at the center suffered from depression or other mental problems. Many contemplated suicide because of the stress of their escape, the report said. "They're lonely people," provincial Gov. Kim Moon-soo said of the defectors. "We offer them psychiatric care."
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| Posted by:Steve White |
| #3 They pine for their families and simpler pleasures of home. The starving kids? The sawdust for supper? The fjords? |
| Posted by: Mullah Richard 2009-07-22 16:01 |
| #2 Panmunjom is only a bus ride away. |
| Posted by: ed 2009-07-22 11:31 |
| #1 If their life in the South is so sad and they are that homesick, let them go home. Heck, give 'em bus fare. And a pair of sneakers for the second half of the trip. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2009-07-22 07:46 |